AAP to test poll waters in Manipur

- Party sets up district committees

KHELEN THOKCHOM

Imphal, Jan. 15: TheAam Aadmi Party (AAP) will contest the Lok Sabha elections from the Northeast, including Manipur and Assam.

The party is setting up district committees to form state committees in the Northeast as part of its efforts to field candidates. It has already set up nine district committees in Assam and four district committees in Manipur. Its next target is Tripura.

“We are preparing to contest the Lok Sabha election from the Northeast. However, I could not say how many candidates will be fielded and from where,” Habung Payeng, national executive member from Arunachal Pradesh, told reporters here today.

Payeng, who is in-charge of the Northeast, arrived in Imphal on Monday as an AAP observer to constitute district committees. He travelled by road from Itanagar to Imphal via Dimapur.

Today, the party constituted district committees for Imphal West and Bishnupur and yesterday it did the same for Imphal East and Thoubal.

Payeng is leaving Imphal tomorrow for Agartala.

“We will attempt to set up district committees and state committees in all the states in the region. AAP is the alternative to the corrupt and failed Congress government in Manipur. We intend to serve the people and enhance development in the Northeast,” Payeng said.

Before the arrival of the central party leaders, the AAP leadership appointed Th. Manihar Singh, a senior high court lawyer from Imphal, as the state co-ordinator to pave the way for opening of the party’s state unit.

First among the known leaders to join the party is Hareshore Goswami, who unsuccessfully contested from Yaiskul constituency on a Trinamul Congress ticket in the last state Assembly election.

The party claimed to enrol more than 3,000 members in Manipur since yesterday. “The number is growing,” Payeng said.

Those joining the party include professionals, retired government employees, lawyers, zilla parishad members and youths.

“I joined the party because I like the ideology of the party and the way its leaders are behaving. The party has made an impact in the country and came to power in Delhi,” Sunder Singh, a zilla parishad member from Imphal East who joined the party, said.

The state co-ordinator of the party, Manihar, said he had made proposals to the Northeast in-charge for contesting the two Lok Sabha seats in Manipur.

“Anyone willing to join the electoral fray on our party ticket can apply,” he said.